artiss.blog

Category: Life

Random thoughts on life

  • Jeff Wayne’s The War of the Worlds UK Tour – Nottingham

    Jeff Wayne’s The War of the Worlds UK Tour – Nottingham

    Back in May, my eldest daughter, Laura, contacted me to see if I was interested in seeing the tour of Jeff Wayne’s War of the Worlds. I’ve been a fan of the musical since 1989, when I got to play my landladies vinyl copy of it. I later bought it on CD and, since then, I’ve managed to get Laura hooked too.

    Laura wanted to go to the tour and it was due to be in Nottingham, near to me, in December. Would I buy her a ticket as a Christmas present? Of course.

    Last Friday was the day (or rather night) of the concert and I went to it knowing nothing of what to expect. I really had no idea.

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  • Bullet points and punctuation

    Bullet points and punctuation

    Just to be clear from the start, I am not a fan of most grammar “rules” (especially as they’re usually anything but). My writing may give that away.

    However, I thought I’d share something I learnt recently about the use of bullet points which does make sense. But, feel free to ignore them.

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  • Why 4v4 Team Deathmatch makes a perfect Overwatch game

    Why 4v4 Team Deathmatch makes a perfect Overwatch game

    I like to dabble in competitive matches – I’ll pluck up the courage occasionally to play one but only after a little warm-up first. I’ll then only play one as, otherwise, I find the stress of them gets to me quite quickly.

    However, my warm-up and then one-game method appears to be working and, this season, I’m doing far better than before. And it may be helped by the fact that I’m using 4v4 Team Deathmatch for that warm-up match.

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  • WordCamp Edinburgh diary: my first talk

    WordCamp Edinburgh diary: my first talk

    Another WordCamp. But this one’s different – I’m not going as a volunteer but as a speaker, to deliver my first ever talk. All the way up in Edinburgh, it’s also going to be the smallest of the WordCamps I’ve attended too. 

    How will the talk go and what is a smaller WordCamp like?

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  • R.I.P. Penny

    R.I.P. Penny

    I can’t believe I’m having to write this but after far too many comments and even people attempting to personally contact me, from people who don’t bother to fully read or just comprehend things, Penny is a family cat and is NOT Penny “the talking cat”. Comments are closed.

    On Monday, one of our (two) cats, Penny, had to be put down. Here’s what I posted to Facebook at the time…

    Sad news. This morning our elder cat, Penny, had to be put to sleep. It looks as if the prolific mouser ate some rat poison, which kicked in overnight.

    As with all our cats, she was a rescue. Licking and rolling over for tummy rubs, we could only assume her previous owner had dogs. She particularly liked the underside of her chin being rubbed. With Charley joining the family in recent years, she came to begrudgingly accept him (but only that).

    Quiet, no-nonsense and not always elegant, she’ll be very much missed, particularly by me. Although I won’t miss her dragging mice into the house.

    She died purring as I stroked her under her chin.

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